New 24-08, New Song

[dcm_guitar]

I waited for two years to get my 24-08. It has finally arrived, and I got to spend some quality studio time with it during the holiday break. Here's the result: "I Can't Breath". It's a really versatile guitar with both single coil and double coil sounds. The 85/15 pickups are hotter than the pickups I normally play, and I ended up having fun grabbing "pick squeals" during the solo (although I don't play with a pick)


I'd REALLY appreciated your 3:50 to listen, and feel free to provide any feedback!! This is a first mix, so things are always in transition.

https://soundcloud.com/radiomoved/i-cant-breathe

 

[Huggy Love]

Good job.
Interesting songwriting and good arranging, I think it could be mixed better though. Mixing is an art that takes some time and attention to master, but pays huge dividends in the end result of your recordings. I struggle at times with it and am no expert but I've gotten better from feedback.

I'd say, the vocals are a bit loud, should be brought down to sound more realistic compared to the instruments, bass & beat needs more bottom, guitar could use some thickness(or smoothness, not sure).

Good presentation and originality though, keep composing!!, hope this helps.

 

[dcm_guitar]

Good job.
Interesting songwriting and good arranging, I think it could be mixed better though. Mixing is an art that takes some time and attention to master, but pays huge dividends in the end result of your recordings. I struggle at times with it and am no expert but I've gotten better from feedback.

I'd say, the vocals are a bit loud, should be brought down to sound more realistic compared to the instruments, bass & beat needs more bottom, guitar could use some thickness(or smoothness, not sure).

Good presentation and originality though, keep composing!!, hope this helps.

Thanks!!!!! I finished it yesterday and mixed and mastered it within a few hours of finishing. I KNOW it needs more mixing work because I’m not great at mixing. I wanted to get something done and out there; even knowing it was going to go through several iterations.

Realistically, I shouldn’t have let anyone hear it after a first mix, but guitar and scotch are powerful influences. ;-)

I sincerely appreciate your feedback and welcome much more!!! Thank you!!!!

 

[Outlier22]

Sounds pretty good to me. ...Then again I don't like stuff to over mixed. Guitar tone sounds good! Did you do all of it? (drums and based and harmonies?)

 

[dcm_guitar]

Sounds pretty good to me. ...Then again I don't like stuff to over mixed. Guitar tone sounds good! Did you do all of it? (drums and based and harmonies?)

It's all me, but......

The drums are software based. I can't play drums.

I started out as a bass player many, MANY moons ago and still love to lay down bass lines.

The harmonies are also me, but I used "electronic trickery" to get them as tight as they are. Listeners today expect virtually perfect vocal pitch given what most things sound like today. I use various approaches depending on how much effort I feel like putting into it. Voice is not my primary instrument.

I'm more than happy to go into more detail about the process if you or anyone else is interested. I love talking about this, but don't want to "over share" when somebody is asking a simple question and only want a simple answer.

 

[Outlier22]

It's all me, but......

The drums are software based. I can't play drums.

I started out as a bass player many, MANY moons ago and still love to lay down bass lines.

The harmonies are also me, but I used "electronic trickery" to get them as tight as they are. Listeners today expect virtually perfect vocal pitch given what most things sound like today. I use various approaches depending on how much effort I feel like putting into it. Voice is not my primary instrument.

I'm more than happy to go into more detail about the process if you or anyone else is interested. I love talking about this, but don't want to "over share" when somebody is asking a simple question and only want a simple answer.

haha I know what you mean.

I was asking because my band mostly gets together to jam but we've been recording sessions with a single mic/recording device and posting the raw recordings on youtube - mostly so we can listen to them . Talk about getting a raw recording. But we've been talking about putting mics on drums and amps so we can edit the levels and get some better results. This came up after we did one session with bass amp direct out to an interface and 2 separate room mics recording the vocals through PA and guitar amps. This somewhat raw "edit" sounded so much better than the single device, so we thought we'd take it a little further. We are just looking at getting the mix right, not trying to sound like a produced album. (especially since almost all of our jams are improvised.)

I was asking about the harmonies because we have just one guy singing and have been talking about adding in harmonies (which means me). So I was thinking about sending a recording back and forth with our singer and running it through a DAW on my side to figure out harmonies for some of our songs. So you didn't record the harmony on a separate take but instead used a harmony device?

 

[dcm_guitar]

haha I know what you mean.

I was asking because my band mostly gets together to jam but we've been recording sessions with a single mic/recording device and posting the raw recordings on youtube - mostly so we can listen to them . Talk about getting a raw recording. But we've been talking about putting mics on drums and amps so we can edit the levels and get some better results. This came up after we did one session with bass amp direct out to an interface and 2 separate room mics recording the vocals through PA and guitar amps. This somewhat raw "edit" sounded so much better than the single device, so we thought we'd take it a little further. We are just looking at getting the mix right, not trying to sound like a produced album. (especially since almost all of our jams are improvised.)

I was asking about the harmonies because we have just one guy singing and have been talking about adding in harmonies (which means me). So I was thinking about sending a recording back and forth with our singer and running it through a DAW on my side to figure out harmonies for some of our songs. So you didn't record the harmony on a separate take but instead used a harmony device?

If you're looking at recording the band live and want to get enough tracks to get a good mix you're in for a FUN, but potentially complicated experience. Bass and vocals are the easiest because they can go direct to the board. Guitars are the next easiest because you can pretty easily mic an amp and get good results. You can also use some recording specific devices for electric guitar that are AMAZING and let you use your own tube amp, but are also an investment in recording (UAD OX, Two Notes Torpedo, etc.)

Drums. Drums are hard. Capturing drums is an art form all to itself. You can go down a path of LOTS of mics and it just gets more and more complex..... To keep it relatively simple, a good place to start recording a drum set is to look up the Glyn Johns method. It takes 3 or 4 mics and can give very reasonable results.

Harmonies......Some harmonies are pretty easy to figure out and some are a lot more involved. I go through a couple of processes for harmonies depending on how realistic I need the harmonies to sound. I think one approach I use may work fo ryou if you don't know exactly what you want to sing for the harmony part.

I use Melodyne. It's an additional plug-in to my DAW. There are a couple of good YouTube tutorials. Basically, you take a vocal track, and transfer it into Melodyne (you do this by pushing a button, and the vocal track is recorded into Melodyne). Once the track is in Melodyne you can literally grab the notes and adjust them. If you want to hear a harmony that's a major third above the original vocal, you just drag the notes up a major third. It's pretty cool.

I will manipulate my vocal track until I get a harmony part that I like. I usually print this manipulated vocal track to another track in my DAW. Then, I keep this manipulated track in my headphones as a guide track and I actually record me singing the harmony line I'm hearing in my headphones. This helps keep me in pitch since I'm not a great singer.

 

[goat-n-gitter]

Nice job!
I concur with Huggy B about the mix - the instruments are a bit buried compared to the vox. You're a much better singer than me - I'll do backgrounds all day long, but my voice out front sounds like a leaky steam pipe, so I don't sing lead on any finished recordings. I do like your idea about using melodyne to help map out the harmonies, I might have to try that.
The guitar tones and playing sound great!
If your interested, you can check out my original recordings on soundcloud under my same user name.

Thanks for sharing.

 

[mrcnn]

Sounds great!
Which drum software do you use?

 

[dcm_guitar]

Sounds great!
Which drum software do you use?

I use EZ Drummer. It's the "stripped down" version of Superior Drummer, but it has so much built-in functionality and sounds so good I've never seen the need to "upgrade".

 

[mrcnn]

I use EZ Drummer. It's the "stripped down" version of Superior Drummer, but it has so much built-in functionality and sounds so good I've never seen the need to "upgrade".

I thought it was EZDrummer Great piece of software (i've been using it for a few months now), although i think all kick drum sounds in basic version are really weak. They all sound a little bit too compressed (to much 'punch') and low quality.

 

[dcm_guitar]

I thought it was EZDrummer Great piece of software (i've been using it for a few months now), although i think all kick drum sounds in basic version are really weak. They all sound a little bit too compressed (to much 'punch') and low quality.

You can output the raw kick drum to it’s own track in your DAW and process it to your heart’s content if you want. For the song here I was lazy and just used the stereo out for the drum sounds, but for more involved projects I do output the drums to individual tracks and mix that way.